Since I've started watching a lot of food bloggers on YouTube, it's started to suggest I watch more food stuff there, including this one guy on the Martha Stewart channel called Thomas Joseph. He has a series of interesting videos called Kitchen Conundrums where he explains how different choices in baking affect the outcome. I happened to watch the one about brownies and he talked about fudgey vs. cakey brownies (the former wins hands down, of course). It's not surprising - less flour and more fat means fudgier brownies, but it's still interesting, and other videos are also good. Alex suggested I try his recipe, to see if he's any good. Turned out pretty great actually.

Also, he's very good-looking, and kind of stereotypically gay (have no idea if he's come out or not). The comments on his "pound cake" video are not particularly imaginative.

Hmmm. Not a good transition, but I did sort of help make pound cake this weekend. Lemon poppyseed. It was tasty, but I didn't do most of the work. I did division of labor with my friend and did all of the dinner cooking - a garlicky tahini spinach chickpea soup I like a lot- while she handled dealing with her mixer and zesting lemons and whatnot.

Anyhow, it was yum, but I think traditional pound cake may just be too rich for me. I find myself comparing it to the quickbreads I usually make and wishing it were more like those. *Shrug*

He does not spout ever more, new stupidities. He "diversifies his wrongness portfolio."(My pronouns are She/Her/Hers)

bessie wrote:Moo, my slow cooker's pot is cracked also, and I've been using liners (which I learned about here in the crockpot thread!). They're a little pricey for a plastic bag, but cheaper than replacing the pot, and cleanup is fast. I can leave the house and I don't need to worry about liquid seeping through the crack.

So, sad face, I can's find liners in South Africa; but I think I'm going to try oven cooking bags and see how it goes.

Proverbs 9:7-8 wrote:Anyone who rebukes a mocker will get an insult in return. Anyone who corrects the wicked will get hurt. So don't bother correcting mockers; they will only hate you.

Hawknc wrote:FFT: I didn't realise Proverbs 9:7-8 was the first recorded instance of "haters gonna hate"

All this Instagram/YouTube stuff does the job! I started to cook more Last weekend I prepared a vegetarian kebab (after watching a YouTube Channel of some Turkish women). She made it so tasty on video, but my vegetarian variant with goat cheese was not worse I am sure. Served with Tzatziki sauce with a loooot of garlic! Want to make it again. Pretty simple, fast and healthy dish.

I made bbq ribs, where I did the rub, then cooked it in a pressure cooker. It was brought to pressure with a cup of chicken stock. When I finished, I'm left with 2 cups of juices, which I fridged, and separated the oil from. What do I do with the rib/pork stock? I tried using it for pork wonton soup as a base, but it felt too strong. (ended up 1 part stock, and 3 parts water, still too strong). So far, I've used it to deglaze asparagus fond, or to mix with bbq sauce to make it flow better.Rub recipehttp://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2016 ... ecipe.html

It was delicious -- I wish I'd added more chiles than I did. Because I'm in a small town in the Midwest, I didn't exactly have much of a selection there, so I went with dried New Mexico chiles (I rehydrated them).

The crumb had this neat orange color, and was nice and open, yet still soft and delicious. It was excellent with or without butter.

An almost Chinese roast duck. Broke the duck down into quarters, more in the French style than the Chinese method of "whack it into bits with a cleaver", then steamed it for 20 minutes in the instant pot, using teriyaki sauce, loads of ginger and a few chopped up clementines for the liquid. Crisped up the skin in a skillet, defatted the liquid and pan roasted it for another 15 minutes, then shoved it in a hot oven while I made pancakes from some leftover six grain mix with most of a bunch of scallions chopped in and steamed some asparagus. It was lovely.

Don’t become a well-rounded person. Well rounded people are smooth and dull. Become a thoroughly spiky person. Grow spikes from every angle. Stick in their throats like a puffer fish.

PAstrychef wrote:An almost Chinese roast duck. Broke the duck down into quarters, more in the French style than the Chinese method of "whack it into bits with a cleaver", then steamed it for 20 minutes in the instant pot, using teriyaki sauce, loads of ginger and a few chopped up clementines for the liquid. Crisped up the skin in a skillet, defatted the liquid and pan roasted it for another 15 minutes, then shoved it in a hot oven while I made pancakes from some leftover six grain mix with most of a bunch of scallions chopped in and steamed some asparagus. It was lovely.

PAstrychef wrote:An almost Chinese roast duck. Broke the duck down into quarters, more in the French style than the Chinese method of "whack it into bits with a cleaver", then steamed it for 20 minutes in the instant pot, using teriyaki sauce, loads of ginger and a few chopped up clementines for the liquid. Crisped up the skin in a skillet, defatted the liquid and pan roasted it for another 15 minutes, then shoved it in a hot oven while I made pancakes from some leftover six grain mix with most of a bunch of scallions chopped in and steamed some asparagus. It was lovely.

Sounds AH-MA-ZING.

Made meatballs in tomato sauce in an oven baking bag in my cracked slow cooker. Not bad.

Proverbs 9:7-8 wrote:Anyone who rebukes a mocker will get an insult in return. Anyone who corrects the wicked will get hurt. So don't bother correcting mockers; they will only hate you.

Hawknc wrote:FFT: I didn't realise Proverbs 9:7-8 was the first recorded instance of "haters gonna hate"

Recently made flan, the super simple four-ingredient condensed milk kind, because I bought a flanera to use for pot-in-pot cooking with my pressure cooker. And then I wanted flan. I've actually never made it before, though I love it; I would like to find (hint hint, if anyone has a handy recipe) a good recipe that doesn't use condensed milk and is a bit less sweet, as the caramel provides plenty of sweetness.

As soon as I get my hands on some galangal, I'm making somlah marakot again.

D'you know that I only recently discovered that moussaka isn't traditionally vegetarian? It's so savory even without meat that I think I actually prefer it that way, unless I suppose if it were a one-pot meal, or had goat (which I very much prefer to beef or mutton). This is a tangent since I haven't recently made moussaka - but maybe I should plan to make vegetarian moussaka.

Love this dish. Though I never have bitter oranges and I found I prefer turmeric to achiote so my version is not so authentic. Plus, who has time for banana leaves? I should try it some time at a restaurant, done properly, if I can find it.

Nath wrote:I found some guanciale, so we made spaghetti carbonara and sauteed broccolini.

I read "found some guacamole" and almost had a cow, man.

Zohar wrote:Also, he's very good-looking, and kind of stereotypically gay (have no idea if he's come out or not).

Thought you were talking about Alex at first, was thinking, uhhhhh... wat? (For context, I am drinking a leetle bit)

On Saturday, we made pressure cooker lamb stew, soda bread, Brussels sprouts, and green beans with shallots; sort of a belated St Patrick's day meal. Washed down with Black Butte Porter instead of Guinness.

Had a couple of friends over. Made giant Persian noodle-lentil-bean soup with tons of herbs (like, it turned out almost green) and turmeric. Delicious. I also made a chocolate babka for dessert. It turned out pretty good, but I think I'd like to roll it finer in the future so there aren't as many areas of just-tasty-somewhat-dry-dough.

Salmon cakes: a can (14 oz) or equivalent quantity of poached salmon (also works with mackerel or other fish), two beaten eggs, spices and seasonings to taste (last night's: salt, pepper, cumin, coriander, cayenne, paprika, mustard powder), optional chopped aromatics (scallions last night; fresh chiles work great too). Stir it all together with enough panko breadcrumbs to make it hold together without visible liquidy parts. Cover and ​refrigerate at least half an hour to hydrate the breadcrumbs; if you used enough, there shouldn't be a pool of liquid at the bottom. Dredge with more panko and pan fry until brown and crispy (5-7 minutes per side). Serve with raita, or Thai sriracha, or Cajun remoulade, or whatever other sauce sounds good.

Salad: cut kale into strips, add matchsticks of tart apple and aged Gouda, and toss in a dressing of lemon juice, olive oil, salt, pepper, and a little honey and Dijon.

Zohar wrote:Had a couple of friends over. Made giant Persian noodle-lentil-bean soup with tons of herbs (like, it turned out almost green) and turmeric. Delicious. I also made a chocolate babka for dessert. It turned out pretty good, but I think I'd like to roll it finer in the future so there aren't as many areas of just-tasty-somewhat-dry-dough.

Ooooh, can I beg that soup recipe? That sounds like exactly the sort of thing I'd love!

This weekend I made some dahl, aloo saag and simple rice for potluck lunch today at work. Sadly I only had one other coworker actually follow through on the pot luck aspect, so we just shared lunch a bit. But more vegetables for me, since she made a mushroom and bok choy dish and gingered carrots, nom.

He does not spout ever more, new stupidities. He "diversifies his wrongness portfolio."(My pronouns are She/Her/Hers)

Had my parents over for lunch on Sunday; made a bread pudding from hot cross buns for dessert but it was disappointing and not nearly sweet enough. Made myself a low carb baked egg custard to have instead, it was much better than everyone else's. Oops.

Made pizza last night with that self raising flour + yogurt dough but everything about it was crap. Not the dough's fault; I messed with it too much, I didn't have mozarella, my oven wasn't hot enough.. again, my own flax seed meal and parmesan low carb pizza topped with chilli salsa, cheddar and bacon was much better. And took a quarter of the time to make.

Proverbs 9:7-8 wrote:Anyone who rebukes a mocker will get an insult in return. Anyone who corrects the wicked will get hurt. So don't bother correcting mockers; they will only hate you.

Hawknc wrote:FFT: I didn't realise Proverbs 9:7-8 was the first recorded instance of "haters gonna hate"

Last night I prepped pizza dough for later in the week, stoked that I just got in a new bag of tipo 00 durum wheat flour, which I use for 25% of the flour weight in my pizza dough.

Today I'm making orange sticky buns, but with sumo citrus zest instead of orange (also known as dekopon, it's a very large mandarin hybrid, and is just about the tastiest citrus I can imagine) The season is short for these, and they are sold at a premium (about $1.99 apiece, but they are big, more than a half pound each), so I try to use every little bit of their delicious tastiness (their zest is also super thick, so you get a good bang for your buck).Spoiler for large picture of a smallish dekopon with handsize for reference

Spoiler:

Last night I also made a wonderful chicken pot pie (well, I made and formed the crust, my wife made the awesome filling).

Belial wrote:I am not even in the same country code as "the mood for this shit."

I really liked the lima beans (lima or butter beans? Don't know the difference) in the soup we made last weekend, so Saturday I made a curry-ish dish with them and some chickpeas. I was surprised how quickly we got them to cook - we soaked them (separately) for about two hours, then boiled for less than an hour, I think, and they were done.

The Persian chicken was very nice. First time I made this dish, instead of eating it at a restaurant. I will cook the walnuts a bit more and I added too much liquid when I added the chicken so the sauce was thinner than ideal, but the taste was very close to what I want.Tonight I made a Thai red curry with many vegetables and some duck, then used it as filling in spaghetti squash shells, with the squash as part of the filling. I've been having fun playing with this dish. There are few limits to what will work in the filling and the shells stay nice and rigid when you refill them.

Don’t become a well-rounded person. Well rounded people are smooth and dull. Become a thoroughly spiky person. Grow spikes from every angle. Stick in their throats like a puffer fish.

Alex made a sort-of veggie coq au vin. He asked me to get a rutabaga and used that. Unfortunately it didn't really end up cooked-through and it's a bit too crunchy... Maybe it softened after a night in the fridge, and possibly while heating in the microwave. Oh well.

I started yesterday, and finished today, a chicken soup with rice. Got the leg quarters falling off bone in under an hour thanks to my pressure cooker. Left it with stock vegetables in the fridge overnight and then picked over the chicken, strained the broth in my chinois, and finished off the soup this evening. I'm super pleased with these tools.

On the upside, my new marble coated pans work wonderfully for pancakes (crepes).

On the downside, my most trusty recipe book's pancake recipe results in thick and not so wonderful pancakes. Wonder if I should just thin it with milk, or get a new recipe? My mom will probably have a good one.

Proverbs 9:7-8 wrote:Anyone who rebukes a mocker will get an insult in return. Anyone who corrects the wicked will get hurt. So don't bother correcting mockers; they will only hate you.

Hawknc wrote:FFT: I didn't realise Proverbs 9:7-8 was the first recorded instance of "haters gonna hate"